The Narrow Gate
by seanachai
Summary: Jace Herondale has grown up hating the name Morgenstern, but when he meets Clarissa, the daughter of the very man responsible for his father's death, she isn't at all what he expected.


The dragon demon was massive, it came toward them on all four legs, its long neck extended snakelike and its spine ridges scraping tiles from ceiling of the abandoned subway platform. Its scaly hide was imbedded with tarnished bits of metal that glinted dully in the witchlight. It advanced languidly, blinking sleep from it's enormous garnet eyes. Jace wondered how long it had been down here in the abandoned platform, curled up on a bed of nickels, plastic jewels, little bits of tin foil, brass buttons, and possibly, some more precious items, though he didn't see any lying among the mess on the floor. Had it gotten trapped when the tunnels caved in, or had it remained down here by choice, biding its time while all the other dragons were killed by up above? If he hadn't been in such a dire situation, Jace might have been more appreciative of the opportunity to study a creature thought to have been extinct, but as it was, he wracked his brains for some historical material he might have read on how to kill the thing. A demon was a demon, but he still didn't want to be surprised by some unexpected trait, like an ability to breath fire, which he thought he had read somewhere associated with dragons, but couldn't remember if it was actually true, or just a myth. He desperately hoped for the latter.

Jace glanced at Isabelle, who stood beside him. Blood ran down her face from a cut above her eye, with one hand she clutched a glowing witchlight runestone. With the other hand she held one of Jace's knives, her whip and seraph blades had been lost during the fight in the tunnels. Like him, she looked too tired and determined to be amazed by the rarity of the demon before them. He turned his attention once again to the dragon and called out to Alec, in the darkness behind him.

"How's that door coming?" He heard a thunk, then a grunt of pain.

"Ow, kicking it definitely doesn't work." The demon advanced closer, Its long curved claws clicking on the rubbish underfoot. It emanated the stench of rotting flesh. "And neither does the unlocking rune, I think something's blocking it from the other side."

The demon reached out a hand and raked it's nails along the wall, crumbling bricks into dust. It seemed to be casually threatening them. Watching it advance, an idea popped into Jace's head. An insane idea, but then, his usually were.

"You two stay here, I'm going in."

"What?" Isabel's face was white and eerie, lit from below by the witchlight.

"I'm going to try to lead it. You see how it crumbled that wall? It could get through the debris at the entrance in a second."

"You'll get yourself killed!"

"Maybe not, anyway it's either me or all of us."

Alec abandoned the door and limped up to stand beside Jace. "I'm coming with you."

Isabelle turned. "Don't even think—"

Jace interrupted her. "No, it will be easier on my own. You two stay back here."

The demon was very close now. It's eyes were slit-pupiled, he realized, like a cat's. It opened its maw and growled revealing double rows of yellow teeth.

"Alec," he said, "I mean it. Stay back."

"Don't be stupid, Jace, you haven't even got a seraph blade." This was true, they had lost all the seraph blades they brought with them while fighting the nest of . They had gotten confused in the maze of abandoned , trying to find their way to the surface they had taken an old maintenance passage, and had burst out, finally, relieved, onto this dilapidated platform, letting the iron door slam behind them, only to find their only other exit blocked by rubble, and an enormous, undeniably real dragon awake, irritated, and advancing towards them over a mess of rubble and shiny trinkets. Of course he wouldn't leave, typical Alec, trying to protect the others, even when he was hurt. Which simply meant that Jace would have to take the other option. He took a deep breath, filling his lungs with the cold, fetid air of the abandoned platform, and then he launched himself forward, running full tilt towards the demon, very small before it's mammoth bulk. He raised his bright silver blade and growled back.

"Jace!" Shouted Alec.

He leapt.

Jace felt himself fly through the air, his whole attention focused on the lowered head of the demon before him, and the blade held tightly in his left fist. In the half-second that he flew he knew exactly what he was doing, what to do. Then he slammed into the demon's face, his knife sunk hilt-deep into it's eye. The demon roared in pain and surprise. It shook it's head and threw him across the platform, still clinging to the seraph blade. He hit the asphalt and rolled, then was up on his feet again, dancing away from the demon's half-blind lunges.

"Come on fatso!" He called, twisting away, "You clumsy, ugly bastard!" The demon lunged again, turning, trying to keep him in sight of it's single good eye. Jace dodged toward the rubble that covered the entryway. Nimbly, he clambered up the heap of broken stonework. He climbed as high as he could go, and then swung himself up onto what remained of the ledge above the entranceway. The demon followed, swinging its great claws, it smashed through the blocks below, and the world exploded into dust and noise. The ledge beneath him collapsed and Jace fell coughing, blinded by the grit in his eyes. He hit the platform floor hard, and tasted blood. His vision was blurry and the floor seemed very comfortable after that long fall. He felt that he'd like to sleep there for a while. But there was a hand slapping his face, and Alec's voice sounding very urgent.

"Jace!", Alec was saying, "Get up! You've got to get up!" Jace opened his eyes. Alec's face was hovering above him. He saw the blood on his friend's forehead, and the panic in his blue eyes, and remembered suddenly where they were. With what seemed like a monumental effort, he pushed himself upright, and looked beyond Alec to where Isabel stood, framed in the dim light emanating from a newly opened hole in the rubble barricade. He could see a staircase behind her, promising a return to the sunlit world above. Alec was standing over him now, trying to pull him to his feet, but his legs didn't seem able to take the weight of his body.

"The demon." His own voice sounded thin and garbled, as if someone else were speaking from a long ways away. "The demon, where is it?" Then the shadowy ceiling twisted, and he realised that he needn't have asked, because the demon was right there, hovering above them, eclipsing the rest of the world with its darkness and stench. Jace looked at its eyes and found that they were very dark, that they were composed of darkness, two tunnels that led to the end of the world, into which no light could ever pierce. Jace listened to its voice, and found that its words were very easy to understand. It was telling him that he was going to die, that the dark was infinitely more vast and powerful than he was, and it would swallow him, and take him to a place from which he could never return. And then suddenly, impossibly, in the darkness of the abandoned subway platform, there appeared a shooting star. A brilliant missile of light that guided itself towards the demon, and pierced its heart. For a moment it stuck there, and time stood perfectly still, until the demon collapsed in on itself, and crumpled, convulsing, into nothing.

Jace sat down gently, and simply stared for a moment, entirely bemused, until he followed Alec's gaze towards the stairway, from which the projectile had come. It was a seraph blade, Jace realised, and at the bottom of the stairs, holding another similar blade, stood the person who must have thrown it. Not Isabelle, she was crouched to the side, regarding the new arrival with astonishment. This was a person Jace had never seen before, and he understood, as the figure approached, that he must be dreaming, because it was not a person at all, but rather a creature of fire. He became aware, then, that he was lying on a mattress, and that there was a painful throbbing in his head, and that light in from dream was in reality the golden-red of sunlight filtering through his eyelids.

Jace opened his eyes and blinked against the brightness of daylight. He looked around and catalogued his situation. He was lying on a cot in the Institute infirmary. His head hurt like hell and a horrible smell assailed his nostrils, emanating, he realized, from the bowl that a concerned-looking Isabelle held before him. She appeared to have just walked in and was standing over him. Her long black hair was sleek and draped loosely over one shoulder, and her face was free of the bruises she had received in his dream.

"You're awake," she said. "Good, I made you some soup." She moved the bowl closer and Jace had restrain himself from gagging.

"No, thanks." He told her hurriedly. "I'm actually not hungry. Maybe just some of Hodge's tea..." He spied the mug on his bedside table and reached for it, then cringed back as the movement made his head feel like it was splitting in half. He was debating which would be worse; risking passing out, or asking her to get it for him when she noticed his dilemma.

"Oh please," said Isabelle, she rolled her eyes and set the soup down on the table, then handed the mug to him. He took it and sipped slowly. The tea tasted like fennel, honey, and something bitter and dark that he didn't recognize. His head began to feel better at once.

"So," he looked up at her quizzically from the half-empty mug. "Do you want to tell me why I'm…" he gestured to his prone body.

"Lying in bed with your head wrapped in about seventy yards of bandage?" She folded her arms and put on her most obnoxious expression. "Well someone decided to go after a great big demon all by himself and-"

"Isabelle-"

She sighed and sat down. "Fine, I won't nag. You fractured your skull, Jace. You broke half your ribs, got some nasty internal bleeding, snapped an arm and sprained an ankle. We're lucky Clarissa arrived at the last minute to finish off the demon and help us drag you out. We barely got you out of there alive. Then Hodge wasn't so sure he could heal you himself and-"

"Wait," said Jace. "Clarissa? Who's Clarissa?" He had a vague memory of there having been another person in his dream, a strange flaming creature, that threw seraph blades like shooting stars, but he had been ready to chalk it up to delusion.

"I am," said a voice from the doorway. A girl with pale, freckled skin and curling red hair stood there. She looked about Isabelle's age, but she was so tiny Jace doubted she would even come up to her shoulder. "Hi," she said, and gave him a half-smile.

Other than the brilliant hair, this girl looked nothing like the creature he remembered from the abandoned subway platform. She barely even looked like a shadowhunter, though he could see from her fiery hair where the delusion of flames had come from. She wore sturdy black clothing that seemed to have been intended for a man several sizes larger than herself, and practical, heel-less leather boots. It was the antithesis of anything Isabelle would ever wear, and served to both completely hide her figure, and make her appear even smaller than she was. She wasn't bad looking, he thought, really she was quite pretty, so why in the world was she dressed like that? What kind of girl chose to dress like a homeless vicar? She raised her eyebrows and he realized he hadn't responded to her greeting.

"Hello," he said.

"So," said Clarissa, still leaning against the doorway, "You look a bit better than the last time I saw you, I mean, you're awake. How's the head?" Jace reached up and felt the bandage that encased his scull. He realized what he must look like and cringed internally.

"A lot better," he said. "Great, in fact. I think it's about time this bandage was replaced by a smaller one so that I can walk around without my head falling off from the weight of it." Isabelle, who had been fixing her lipstick in the mirror beside his bed, turned around and gave him a disapproving look.

"Oh, no you don't!" she said. "You are not moving one inch until Hodge gives the OK. I know you, If you're not physically restrained you'll be out fighting again and end up in even worse shape, which would be dead, by the way."

"Well call Hodge then, I feel fine."

"You know, Jace, normal humans like to rest."

"Well, I'm hardly human and definitely not normal so you shouldn't be surprised."

"Look, I just came to see if you were awake," said Clarissa to Jace. "Obviously you are, so I'll leave you two to it." She nodded politely to them both, and before either Jace or Isabelle could respond she slipped out the door as quietly as she had come.

"I think you offended our guest," said Isabelle.

"Oh, I offended her? I was perfectly charming, as I always am."

"Right," said Isabelle. "I meant to say 'scared her off with your appearance.'" She rapped his enormous head bandage with her knuckles. Jace frowned.

"I think that's the first time anyone has ever suggested that my appearance was less than magnificent." He said. Then, before she could respond; "By the way, where's Alec?"

"Oh he was here for hours, I could barely get him to leave. Now he's babysitting Max until mum and dad get back from some meeting." Jace raised an eyebrow at her.

"How did that work out?" Isabelle grinned.

"Well originally I was supposed to, but I pulled the 'women's jobs in a men's world' card on mum and she ate it right up. I'm sure Alec will come soon. In the meantime get some sleep, you need it." She hopped off the chair and sauntered out the door.

"Isabelle," Jace called. She reappeared in the doorway. "Take the soup away, will you? Before I asphyxiate." He grinned at her, evilly. She scowled at him, made a motion of dumping the bowl over his head, but took it, and again left.

Hodge must have put something strong in that tea, because Jace began to feel drowsiness creep over him, and he yawned hugely. As sleep threatened to pull him under he found himself contemplating the pale and freckled face that hovered behind his eyelids, surrounded by it's mane of fiery hair. Clarissa, he knew he'd heard the name before, but there must be hundreds of Clarissas among the ranks of the nephilim, it was a common enough name, wasn't it? There was something about her that appealed to him intrinsically, that quiet, slightly hoarse voice, and the frank way she'd looked at him. He wondered what color her eyes were. She hadn't said how long she was planning to stay, but surely there would be time to talk to her, to get to know her better, maybe even to find out what was underneath all that ugly clothing. He grinned at the idea, and with that happy thought still floating in his mind, sank softly into darkness.


End file.
